Today, EU Foreign Ministers will meet with US State Secretary Mike Pompeo. Just last week, US President Donald Trump announced economic sanctions against officials of the International Criminal Court who are investigating potential war crimes by U.S. troops in Afghanistan. My statement on this:

Serious violations of human rights must be examined and punished, regardless of who commits them. That also applies to the American military. President Trump’s behavior is shameless, and it is obvious what he wants to achieve: By threatening employees of the International Criminal Court with sanctions for doing their job, he tries to block justice via the ICC to protect the US military. As a result, the United States is moving closer and closer to countries that prefer to cover up human rights violations instead of investigating them. When the Foreign Affairs Council meets with Secretary of State Pompeo today, I expect the ministers of foreign affairs to be clear about the issue and back the ICC. Trump’s attack on the ICC needs to be addressed internally, but beyond that, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, has to make a clear statement at the subsequent press conference.